How to format your references using the Journal of Tropical Life Science citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Journal of Tropical Life Science. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Find the style here: output styles overview
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

Klein J (2000) Smart polymer solutions. Nature 405 (6788): 745, 747.

A journal article with 2 authors

Montagner JP, Ritsema J (2001) Geology. Interactions between ridges and plumes. Science (New York, NY) 294 (5546): 1472–1473.

A journal article with 3 authors

Yang R, Willett SD, Goren L (2015) In situ low-relief landscape formation as a result of river network disruption. Nature 520 (7548): 526–529.

A journal article with 5 or more authors

Andersson RL, Ström V, Gedde UW et al. (2014) Micromechanics of ultra-toughened electrospun PMMA/PEO fibres as revealed by in-situ tensile testing in an electron microscope. Scientific reports 4 6335.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

Center for Chemical Process Safety (1995) Guidelines for Technical Planning for on-site Emergencies. Hoboken, NJ, John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An edited book

Tuszynski JA (2006) The Emerging Physics of Consciousness. Berlin, Heidelberg, Springer.

A chapter in an edited book

Compton V, France B (2012) Working With Technologists on Technology Curriculum Development and Implementation. In: France B, Compton V eds Bringing Communities Together: Connecting Learners with Scientists or Technologists. Rotterdam, SensePublishers. pp 73–88.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for Journal of Tropical Life Science.

Blog post

Evans K (2016) Here’s What A Serving Size Of Each Of Your Favorite Foods Looks Like. https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/heres-what-a-serving-size-of-each-of-your-favorite-foods-looks-like/. (2016)Accessed: October 2018.

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

Government Accountability Office (2005) Special Education: Children With Autism. Washington, DC, U.S. Government Printing Office.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

Magner TJ (2014) Performance and leadership in multiplayer online gaming. Doctoral dissertation, Pepperdine University

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

Burghardt LF (2007) Neighbors Protest Flea Market’s Move to Belmont Park. New York Times 14CN5.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

This sentence cites one reference [2].
This sentence cites two references [2, 4].
This sentence cites four references [2, 4, 6, 8].

About the journal

Full journal title	Journal of Tropical Life Science
Abbreviation	J. Trop. Life Sci.
ISSN (print)	2087-5517
ISSN (online)	2527-4376
Scope

Research and Writing Guides